A conventional WiFi-Dock wirelessly transfers data between the dock and a mobile device such as a host. The WiFi-Dock may be equipped with a sensor platform capable of measuring many Use-Environment and User contexts to identify Nearness/Presence (User-Proximity), Touch and Pressure, Fingerprint, Vision, Heading, Kinetics, etc. The WiFi-Dock sensor data should be processed by a smart multimedia component locally or in the Host to integrate the WiFi-Dock into a Host HLOS Application processing environment. Tracking sensor operation for calibration to identify ground-truth and synchronizing different sensor outputs to ensure reliable operation requires a datapath between the WiFi-Dock and smart multimedia component. When the multimedia component is in the Host, the Host connection to the Dock is not always ON. While sensor data is being transferred to the multimedia component, control messages and configuration data are regularly delivered to the WiFi-Dock to calibrate/baseline its sensor to ensure reliable operation. If the multimedia component is in the Host, the transmission of data occurs when the Host is ON and must be stored or cached if the Host is not ON when the data is ready to transfer. This constant transfer of data requires the power-manager in the WiFi-Dock and the Host to avoid disrupting the datapath to the Host as much as possible. Although the WiFi-Dock can be wall-plugged or wirelessly charged, the mobile device Host connected to the WiFi-Dock will still be expected to operate regularly with a battery and its battery life will be a critical performance attribute. Optimizing WiFi power requires SLEEP and causes disruption of the AP/GO and station communication, which adds latency in the datapath between the WiFi-Dock sensor platform and Host. For example, if sensor data is detected in the Dock but the Host is not ON, the sensor data must be stored until the Host is ON and ready to receive the data. This adds latency from the time the Dock detects the sensor data and the time the multimedia component in the Host receives and processes the data.
Accordingly, there are long-felt industry needs for methods that improve upon conventional methods including the improved methods and apparatus provided hereby.
The inventive features that are characteristic of the teachings, together with further objects and advantages, are better understood from the detailed description and the accompanying figures. Each of the figures is provided for the purpose of illustration and description only, and does not limit the present teachings.